Phantom
by Corisu Li
Summary: [MS] Being accused of murder is no walk in the park... especially not when the accuser is the ghost of a man you've never even seen before, and he's taking to haunting you and your shower, when you're in it. Poor Sango...
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

Faint white figures paint my sleep;  
Please don't tell my secrets, keep them hidden.  
-Coheed and Cambria, Blood Red Summer

The museum's curator closed his leather-bound notebook with a snap, the worn cover still managing to look expensive in the dim light of his office. Smiling in a way that made the wrinkles around his eyes deepen, he pushed his seventy-year-old frame out of his chair and reached across his desk. "It was a pleasure doing business with you, Miss Tenaka."

The young woman in the chair opposite rose as well, and clasped his hand in a brief shake. "I'm glad to do it. My parents' heirlooms should be put to good use, after all." Signing several of her parents' collected antiques over to one of the largest museums in Japan had been an almost split-second decision, but it was one that she was quite glad to make. The money that she made from the investment was a nice incentive, as was seeing her name on the plaque that designated the museum's beneficiaries.

The transaction over, she turned away from the cheerful old curator and picked up the small portfolio lying on the desk. "The items will be picked up later this week. How does Thursday sound?" The man was circling his desk now, crossing the room in his careful, cane-assisted gait and opening the door of his office.

"Thursday is perfect. I don't have anything planned." Tucking the portfolio housing pictures of her family antiquities under her arm, she joined him at the door. "Pleasure doing business with you," she said with a polite nod, then stepped out of the room.

The bustle of the main museum was a slight jolt after the silence of the office - small children describing what they saw in loud voices to their complacent parents, the general buzz of conversation. She took her time walking to the main entrance, glancing at the exhibits and realizing with no small amount of pride that her own possessions would soon be among them. As she neared the door, she noticed that the shoes of a man who'd just entered were squeaking against the lacquered floor. 'It's raining,' she thought morosely. The weathermen had been wrong again - the showers had begun much earlier than they'd predicted, and she hadn't brought an umbrella.

Luckily, she was mere feet away from the museum's gift shop, thankfully full of gaudy merchandise. Most assuredly, a gaudy umbrella was among the things being sold. Stepping onto the carpeted floor of the shop, she began to scan the displays with a purpose, uninterested in the small model samurai or the assorted plush toys. It was almost as if everything was purposefully jumbled together to make it impossible to get through the place without seeing every single item that they had for sale.

"Tenaka! Hey, you're Sango Tenaka, right?" A very effeminate male voice called to her from the other side of the shop. Poking her head out of the aisle into which she'd just stepped, the brunette caught sight of a man waving in her direction from behind the cashier's counter. His long hair was twisted up into a bun, and he appeared to be wearing makeup (though she sincerely hoped not).

"Um." Backpedaling, Sango brought her entire body back into view and blinked at the man. "Yes?"

Whether that was an answer or a question was absolutely unclear, but the cashier didn't seem to care either way. "Oh, I knew it!" Then, to her chagrin, he waved her over. Resignedly, Sango trudged over to where he stood, looking rather like a prisoner headed to the gallows. All she'd wanted was to find an umbrella to get her home without half-drowning… "…what you're doing for the museum," he finished. Sango stared. He'd been talking while she'd been fretting, and she'd pretty much missed everything that had been said.

"It's no problem," she guessed with confidence. Apparently, this was the right answer, because he smiled.

"All right, now that we've gotten that out of the way…" he cleared his throat and seemed to pull on his shopkeeper demeanor. "I'm Jakotsu. How may I help you, hmm?"

Heaving a mental sigh of relief, Sango clung to the safe subject. "I need an umbrella."

No sooner had the words left her lips than Jakotsu was pushing an umbrella in her direction. It was made of clear plastic, and judging by the small tag on the handle, it bore the image of two crossed katana when open. Traditional tasteless museum stock umbrella. She reached for her pocket to seek out money for payment. "How much?"

Jakotsu looked fairly scandalized. "Oh, there's no charge! Not for someone as generous as yourself!"

Dimly, Sango wondered if he even knew that she was getting paid for her little 'donation'. She had no time to consider this, though, because the umbrella was being pushed into her arms, and she had to grab hold of it before it dropped onto her toe. "Er… thank you. I'll be going, then." She jerked her head toward the door as if to remind him where it was, then walked backward a few paces before turning and trotting back into the entryway.

The squeaking of wet soles was even louder now, and the gentle purr of rain on the high roof hinted at the driving rain outside. It had been such a nice day too, she mused, shifting her portfolio to gain a better grip on the handle of the umbrella. That was half of the reason that she'd decided to walk to this little meeting. Traffic would be hellish at this time of day, too - rain or shine, it was preferable to walk.

Pushing through the revolving doors, she stood under the scaffolding just long enough to put up the umbrella (which was depressingly small). That done, she stepped out into the downpour, the scent of wet leaves and concrete strong on the still-humid air.

The museum wasn't too far from Sango's house, but the heavy rain made the walk seem infinitely long. She didn't want to walk too quickly; a long stride would inevitably lead to a slip and fall, and the last thing she needed was to be drenched in water. The rain pattered loudly on the taut plastic above her, and she could see the dark, cloudy sky though the material.

Her thoughts turned to the little store that she owned, and she wondered if anyone had even shown up for work that day. Though Sango had loaned her more expensive antiques to the museum, she still owned many smaller trinkets that attracted the occasional wealthy buyer. It was for this reason that she'd opened up a small antique shop, filled with things ranging from jewelry to hand-painted pottery. Business was never really booming, but one sale could bring in quite a bit of cash; this allowed Sango to live comfortably off the profits and her inheritance. On rainy days such as this, however, her employees might deem the weather too adverse to go to work. Sango didn't mind much if they took an unplanned day off, hence the reason that they did it in the first place.

The rain began to slacken a bit, much to her relief. The noise of the rain on the top of the umbrella ceased to be thunderous and became a gentle drumming. She let out a sigh of relief, then, much to her surprise, a chilly wind caught her hair despite the evening's humid heat. Involuntarily, she shivered - and then, there was another sensation of cold, this one brushing across the back of her neck like fingers.

This feeling was so strong that she whirled around to look behind her, eyes wide and staring. Immediately, the cool breeze vanished, leaving the air as warm as it had been before. Of course, there was no one behind her, save a cyclist who was riding his bike on the street side of the curb, navigating between the bumper-to-bumper traffic and the sidewalk. Breathing out slowly and telling herself that she was being silly, Sango turned and began to walk once more.

Straightening her umbrella from its slightly leaning position, she walked a mere five meters before the man on the bike passed her. Apparently, he'd been pedaling much faster than she'd originally thought, because when he rode past, the tires of his bike splashed through a rather large puddle and created a veritable wave of muddy water. Sango's khakis were now spotted with rather large spots of mud. Marvelous. She glared at the man's retreating back for a moment, as if willing him to crash into a fire hydrant.

When he was out of sight, Sango turned her attention back to her poor, muddied pants. "Damnit." She swiped her hand over the largest of the smears and only succeeded in spreading a swatch of the stuff over her knee. Cursing again, she looked around at the buildings on her side of the street, hoping to see a place where she could get the worst of the stuff off. She was only going home, sure, but it would surely stain if she allowed it to stay there longer than necessary.

Fortunately for her, she'd stopped near her favorite coffee shop. Everyone there knew her, and it wouldn't be a hassle for her to persuade someone to let her sit a bit and clean up.

As Sang walked toward the door, a man exited, holding a steaming cup in one hand. In a typically gentlemanly manner, he held the door open for her as she closed her umbrella and shook as much moisture from it as he could. "Thank you," she said out of habit, not even looking at him long enough to discern anything but the fact that he was smiling.

"My pleasure," was his smooth reply, and Sango merely grunted in irritation and moved into the shop. The scent of brewing coffee and sweet confections cheered her up almost immediately. It was warm in the shop, but comfortably so; two large ceiling fans revolved slowly overhead, keeping the place from becoming stuffy. As soon as the door shut behind her, the sound of rain vanished and was replaced by soft, tasteful music.

Leaving her wet umbrella beside the door, Sango crossed to the bar, which actually looked more suited to serve alcohol than coffee. The bottles lined up on the wall that looked like hard liquor actually held cinnamon, hazelnut, and other assorted flavorings. Sitting down on one of the firm green stools, she peered across at the cash register where a dark-haired girl was ringing up a customer's order.

Grabbing a few napkins from the dispenser, Sango began to brush at the mud again, making a little more progress this time. Four rather muddy napkins were sitting on the bar within a matter of minutes, and she was working on a fifth when a cheery voice said, "Hey, there, Sango. The usual?"

Sango looked up to see the dark-haired girl from earlier smiling at her. "Not today, Kagome. Some soapy hot water would be great, though. Some jerk splashed me."

Kagome rolled her eyes in sympathy. "The weather's awful, huh? Just a sec." The younger girl vanished into the back, and Sango took the moment to contemplate, resting an elbow on the bar.

Sango had long ago come to the conclusion that her life was quite boring. Being the owner of her small antique shop really didn't count as a 'job', meaning that most of her time was either spent in front of the television or wandering the streets. She didn't even had a love interest (well, there was Kuranosuke, but she didn't really count him most of the time). Her life was an endless cycle of tedium, and it was on days like this that she realized it most. If mere _rain_ could make her day more interesting, she definitely needed a change of routine.

Kagome, ever the efficient one, returned and set a steaming glass of frothy water and a clean white cloth on the bar in front of her friend. "There you go. Try not to rub in circles. That only makes the stain work in deeper."

Sango, who had been rubbing in circles since she'd sat down, grumbled something bitter and seized the cloth, dipping it into the water and setting to scrubbing again. She _really _just wanted to go to sleep tonight, without having to worry about doing her laundry as well to get those stains out... "Not very busy, is it?" she asked Kagome conversationally.

Kagome looked around to be sure that there were no waiting customers before leaning over the bar to talk. "Nah. You'd be surprised, though, how many people will stagger in after this rain stops. Something about coffee while the trees drip is very attractive to most."

"Don't get all philosophical on me." Sango sighed, dipping the cloth again and nearly scalding her fingertips. The dirt was coming off fairly easily now. She'd been right in her decision to come in here. The shop was empty of people to wonder what she was doing, save for a couple in the far corner and a pale-haired man at the other end of the bar who was reading the 'Arts and Religion' section of the newspaper. "What time do you get off today, anyway?"

Looking up from where she'd been wiping down the counter, Kagome looked pensive for a moment. "Nine. I have to close up, though, so it'll probably be about ten."

"Hm," Sango muttered. Only a few spots left now. "Movie night?" Even in her twenties, Sango could appreciate the occasional good movie. "A good horror film just came out on DVD, and I thought..."

She trailed off as Kagome began to slowly shake her head. "I've got classes over at the community college in the morning. As much as I'd like to, staying up all night is out of the question."

Sango smiled wryly. "Ah, it's okay." With the last of the spots scrubbed into oblivion, she dropped the cloth onto the counter beside the napkins. Times like this made it glaringly obvious how mundane and unconventional Sango's life was. Since she didn't need a day job, she didn't have one. She had enough credentials to work, but she just lacked the motivation. Sometimes, she felt like an old infirm, trying to get others to slow down their own lives long enough to help her break the monotony. "I should go, then."

There was a soft clunk as Kagome placed a to-go cup on the counter. "Chocolate frappucino, shot of hazelnut. We'll do the movies tomorrow, Sango - I promise."

Grabbing the cup, Sango stood, her smile rather forced. Though she'd refused it, the first sip of the frozen coffee did wonders for he mood. After she'd said her good-byes to Kagome, she walked out into the newly-broken sunshine in considerably higher spirits. The rain having stopped, she hadn't even bothered to grab the tasteless umbrella. She'd never have used it again, anyway, and it would have turned into useless clutter.

Sipping at the frappucino, she walked the next few blocks quickly. Large swatches of the sidewalk were already dry, shapeless blotches of grayish-white in the dark gray of the saturated concrete. People were pouring back out of wherever they'd fled to escape the rain.

Ten minutes later, Sango was standing at the low gate of the small cemetery that served as her personal shortcut home. No one had been buried there for years, not that it would have given her qualms, anyway. She wasn't one to believe in malevolent spirits. A small path wound through the crumbling tombstones, eventually ending up in a patch of trees very near her home.

The path was muddy because of the rain, but the trees that leaned over it had kept it from turning into a veritable river of muck. Without hesitation, Sango pushed the rusty gate open and slipped into the cemetery, immediately taking to the path and beginning to follow its winding track through the tombstones. The shallow mud made slight sucking sounds against the soles of her shoes, but nothing splashed onto her pants, for which she was very grateful.

The tombstones were of varying ages, the newest dating back five decades. The part of the cemetery in which Sango walked was no longer used, having become full, and the newer gravesites were in the expansion that had been added to the property about ten years ago.

As she walked, that odd sensation came again, a cold brush on the back of her neck. Not even turning this time, she attributed it to the coldness of her drink and completely ignored the fact that, the first time she'd felt it, she hadn't even had the frozen beverage.

After what felt like far too long, Sango was pushing open the door to her house and kicking off her shoes in the entryway, sighing in relief. The day had gone on long enough, and the only thing on her mind was a hot shower and bed. After stepping into the kitchen just long enough to toss her empty cup into the trash, she walked to the end of the hall and into the bathroom. Though she lived alone, she closed and locked the door behind her in typical single-female fashion.

The mud incident, coupled with the humid day, had made her feel rather filthy, so the first blast of water on her skin was very welcome, and she closed her eyes and ducked her head under the water, immediately soaking her scalp. Closing her eyes against the water, she turned her back on the showerhead and groped blindly for the bottle of shampoo that she kept hung on the shower rod. When her hand fell on it, she picked it up and flipped the cap open, cracking one eye open just enough to ensure that she poured the right amount into her head.

At that moment, a flicker of motion caught her eye, and she glanced upward in alarm. There was nothing there, of course, but Sango still pulled back the shower curtain to check. The room was empty, and the lock on the door was still latched. Shaking her head at her own skittishness, she pulled the curtain closed once more, then commenced with washing her hair. Her vigorous scrubbing sent a gob of shampoo foam into her face, and she winced as it inched toward her eye.

"Ow," she grumbled, turning to face the water and allowing it to rinse the suds from her face and hair. Flicking the last of the water from her eyes as she brought her face from under the showerhead, she caught that flicker of movement again. Trying to convince herself that she was imagining things, she tried to ignore it... But her mental alarms wouldn't allow it, and promptly began to clamor for attention.

As quickly as she could, Sango snapped her head upward.

Her eyes fell on a man's face. A man's lecherously grinning face. Then, quite abruptly, the face dropped downward and out of sight.

Sango uttered a startled scream and reached for the shower curtain, pulling it to the side just enough to peer around the edge of it.

The bathroom was utterly empty, just as she'd left it. The lock on the door was still engaged.

As quickly as she could, Sango leapt from the shower, not even pausing to turn the water off, and grabbed her towel from the rack, wrapping it around the necessary parts even as her eyes darted around in search of a weapon. Unfortunately, bathrooms held very little in the way of damaging weaponry... In a moment of panicked desperation, she seized the plunger from beside the toilet and slowly unlocked the bathroom door, ready to attack anything that moved.

What kind of freak was this, anyway, who could get into a locked bathroom and lock it back behind him?

There was no one in the hallway, but Sango was far from relieved. This just meant that he'd gone off to another part of the house, probably prepared to lie in wait until it was time for her to get dressed... Holding the plunger aloft with both hands, Sango crept into the hall and began to creep down it, intent on checking the rest of the rooms.

As far as her senses could tell, after she'd made a ten-minute search of her home, she was the only living thing inside it. Still, she didn't relinquish her weapon, debating whether she should call the authorities. Obviously, the man had run off as soon as he'd been spotted, but who was to say that he wouldn't be back? She decided, though, that the best thing to do first would be to turn off her shower water, at least. As she re-entered the bathroom, wondering idly how he'd managed to peek _over_ the shower curtain (standing on the toilet, maybe?), she noticed that her still-hot shower had almost completely fogged up the room, and beads of moisture were inching down the mirror. With a sigh, she walked over to the shower and reached in, turning off the water with her left hand while her right still held tightly to the plunger. Great... her electric bill would probably give her hell, after heating all of that water.

She was just straightening and wondering if she could persuade Kagome to let her spend the night (no way was she sleeping here until she found out how that guy had gotten in) when a distinctly male voice spoke from behind her. "Boo."

Completely automatically, a short scream escaped Sango's throat. She whirled around, realized that the man was far too close to her, and swung the plunger like a baseball bat.

Said plunger seemingly went right _through_ the man's torso, and the wall took the force of Sango's blow.

Sango blinked. Blinked again. Okay... maybe Kagome had slipped something into Sango's coffee, thinking that she needed something to help her relax... That would explain it - her aim had been off, that was all... Squaring her shoulders again, she swung her weapon again, aiming carefully and ignoring the fact that the man didn't seem to be doing anything to prevent her from striking him.

Yet again, the plunger passed through his body, without so much as ruffling his clothes.

Not quite getting the hint, Sango swung again, and again, and again, until she couldn't lift the damn plunger anymore and could only glare up at him through her wet bangs.

"Are you done?" he asked calmly, an inscrutable smile on his face.

Sango dropped the plunger and sat down heavily on the toilet, staring blankly at the stranger. His short black hair was pulled back in a small ponytail, and his eyes were a soft violet. Now that she was studying him closely, she realized that he looked slightly _incorporeal_, like a shadow given substance and color. His black jeans looked worn, they fit his form very well and had a hole over the left knee. His shirt was deep purple, and proclaimed 'Make Love, Not War' in vibrant gold lettering. Two gold earrings gleamed in his left ear, one on his right. "Who... _what_... are you?"

"Well, that's rather rude of you," he said, crossing his arms and faking a pout. "But, if you'd think about it for a moment, you'd realize that you'd already know."

Despite her utter disbelief (and her hope that all of this was illegal-drug-induced insanity), Sango couldn't help but glare pointedly. "All right, fine. I'm a ghost," he said, spreading his arms wide as if he was an exhibit on display.

"Ah," Sango replied, thinking that she would definitely have to have a talk with Kagome about those illegal narcotics, and remind her that drugs were bad. "Right... and... just why were you spying on me in the shower?"

He looked at her as if he was surprised that she hadn't already figured out the answer to this question. "I'm haunting you, of course."

Sango put a hand to her forehead and sighed. 'Okay, Sango, hold it together...' Aloud, she said, "Just why are you haunting me, hmm?" This night just kept getting weirder and weirder, and at the moment, all she wanted to do was fall asleep and forget all of this (or remember it as a dream).

For a moment, his calm smile flickered to something not unlike anger, but the expression quickly faded. "You mean to tell me that you don't remember? That's low, even for you."

"Remember?" Sango echoed, looking back up at him. "What is there to remember? I've never seen you before."

"Well, that's impossible," he said simply, "since you killed me."

Sango's mind practically shut off. "Wha?" Sango was utterly sure that she hadn't killed a person in her life; hell, she hadn't gotten into a fight since eighth grade. But the fact still remained that there was a ghost standing (floating, she mentally amended, seeing as how his sneakers were hovering about three inches off the ground) in front of her and accusing her of murder. "I did not!" she countered weakly, sounding sort of like she'd been accused of stealing the cookies from the cookie jar. _Who, me?_

"Yes, you did," he replied with conviction. _Yes, you!_

Sango stood abruptly, glaring into his face. "I told you, I've never seen you before!" _Couldn't be!_

"Your face. I remember it. I even remember your name - Sango. It's one of the few things that I do remember. I remember you... and I remember that you killed me."

All right, she'd had enough of this. "Fine. Even though I don't know you, I killed you. Well, you could at least tell me your name so that I could go through my old yearbooks. Maybe I broke your heart once, or something."

The ghost looked defensive. "Maybe you did break my heart. But I know that you _stopped _it."

Sango rolled her eyes, but the conviction that he had was rather frightening. To mask this effectively, she drew on the security blanket of irritability. "Look, just tell me your name!" she snapped.

He paused, then drifted a few inches away from her. "Well... I don't recall."

Sango twitched. "You don't recall...? But you recall that I supposedly killed you? You're delusional, ghost-boy." She walked past him toward the bathroom door and called over her shoulder. "Kindly get the hell out of my house."

"Or what? You'll hit me with a plunger?" the ghost quipped dryly.

With a huff of annoyance, Sango began to walk again, pausing in the doorway to say, "You don't even know who you are. How can you possibly know my name when you don't even know your-" she turned, preparing to glare - only to find the bathroom empty again. He had vanished. "... own."

Coming to her senses quickly, Sango retreated to her own room and closed the door beside her, unsure of how much good it would do her. "Good riddance," she said quietly, then set about cautiously getting dressed for bed and braiding her damp hair. Every shadow was a potential spirit, but she managed to get into bed without perceiving a single ghostly presence.

It took her an hour to convince her subconscious that the encounter had been a hallucination, and another half-hour to fall asleep.

After her breathing had become steady with deep slumber, a cool gust of air from nowhere ruffled her bangs, carrying with it a soft whisper. "Sango..."

* * *

Yep. New fic. Review, please!


	2. Chapter 2

((This chapter is unbeta-ed, so any mistakes that you catch are mine and mine alone. I wanted to wait for the beta, but I'm going home for the weekend and back to the dialup connection of doom. I'll replace it with the beta-ed one eventually. Anyway, consider my inspiration reborn!))

Chapter Two

_This night. Walk the dead._

_In a solitary style and crash the cemetery gates._

-_My Chemical Romance_, Cemetery Drive

In sync with her normal routine, Sango woke up the next morning as soon as the sun made it impossible to stay asleep any longer. At least it was supposed to be a nice day; another bout of overcast skies wouldn't serve to keep her chipper and merry.

Of course, she had no inclination to be chipper and merry, anyway; no matter how much she tried to ignore it, the visitation from the night before was still fresh on her mind. She thought about it as she lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling as the gradually brightening sky threw shafts of sunlight across it and stretched the shadow of her light fixture into an elongated oval. It was quite unfortunate that she couldn't manage to banish the memory of the ghost as easily as she'd banished the very idea that he existed. After all, did she remember every single thing that she'd done in the last ten years of her life? The last two, even? How, then, was it completely improbable that she'd seen that nameless man before?

Sango remained in that pensive state for quite a while, finally brought out of her ruminations by the buzzing of her alarm clock. She always set it to go off at ten-thirty, unless she had somewhere to go (which was a depressingly rare occurrence). Irritably, she slapped at it twice before getting it to shut up, then sat up and swung her legs out of the bed. For some reason, her head was throbbing slightly, and she rubbed her temples for a moment before slipping her house shoes on and standing.

As much as her head hurt, she was actually glad for the feeling. It made it all the much easier to attribute the ghost sighting to some sort of drug that had been slipped into her coffee. It was either that, or Sango was finally going insane.

Needless to say, she preferred to believe that her best friend had slipped her narcotics.

Shuffling her feet slightly, Sango walked into the kitchen and rummaged in a cabinet until she found a clean cup. It was old, bearing the insignia of Tokyo Disneyland and a few pictures of cartoon characters that Sango couldn't even identify. She'd taken her younger brother there a few years back, but now, of course, he was too old for such things. A college student, Kohaku was too busy studying to even consider going to a theme park with his sister.

Setting the faded cup onto the counter, she bent at the waist and opened her small refrigerator, extracting an almost-empty half-gallon carton of orange juice. Studying it, Sango frowned slightly, then shrugged and poured the contents into the cup before tossing the carton in the general direction of the trash can. Not even bothering to see if the carton had actually landed inside, she took her cup and crossed the hallway into her small study.

She called it a study when it was, in fact, a media room. A laptop, a small television, and a Gamecube that had seen better days occupied this particular area. Slipping into her desk chair, she leaned back comfortably and took a small sip of the juice before setting it onto the desk beside her laptop. She then bent down to plug the end of the laptop cord into the wall, figuring that she could at least check her e-mail before heading out for the day.

Sitting up, Sango rapped her head against the underside of the desk and, predictably, began to curse colorfully. Rubbing the back of her head, she used the chair's wheels to backpedal away from the desk before sitting up again, her eyes watering. That did _not_ help her headache at all. What was worse, she'd knocked over her orange juice, and the cup slowly rolled across the desk before falling to the carpet. Luckily for her, though, the direction of the spill was away from all things electronic.

With a sigh, she got to her feet and retrieved a cloth from the bathroom. Upon re-entering the study, though, she became distinctly aware that something was different. Very different.

Her laptop had been moved well out of the way of the spill, and her chair was pushed neatly underneath the desk. The discolored Disneyland cup was sitting upright on top of the television.

Sango stared at this scene for a moment, the cloth slipping until it was held only by her fingertips. Then, deep in denial, she shook her head and told herself that she was being silly. Of course she'd have moved her laptop away from the spill, and she could have picked up the cup, too. After all, people normally couldn't remember automatic actions; completely sane people often couldn't remember whether or not they turned their stoves off at home because they performed the action without thinking.

She wasn't fooling herself at all.

Kneeling beside the spill, she began to mop up the spilled juice, mentally muttering to herself. Just as the cloth began to turn faint orange, someone spoke from behind her. "What, no 'thank you'?"

Not even turning around, Sango said, "Go away. If I don't believe in you, you don't exist. Don't you things thrive on memories or something like that?"

The ghost moved closer, stopping just a hair's breadth from Sango's kneeling form. A wave of cold assaulted her, and she shivered. "Do I feel like a figment of your imagination?" Sango turned, ready to bite out a scathing remark that would hopefully cause the spirit to vanish as he had done on the previous night. He peered calmly back at her, a rather lewd smile on his face.

It took Sango a few moments to determine the reason behind that smile. Since she was facing him now, her front was facing him, and his semi-transparent hands were planted directly on her breasts. Of course, Sango couldn't feel his hands on her as if he were human; it was more of a cold, tingling feeling. It was the principle of the thing, however. With a shriek of "Pervert!", she lifted the hand that wasn't holding the cloth and swung her hand in a vicious arc, connecting with his cheek.

Well, so she would have wished. Actually, her hand went directly through his face, and immediately, her entire lower arm was experiencing the same chill as her chest was. With a wry grin, the ghost removed his hands and held them up in a gesture of surrender.

"You-!" Sango spluttered, her rage stopping the rest of her words halfway out of her mouth. Because of this, she just opened and closed her mouth uselessly for a few seconds before shouting, "Don't do that!"

The ghost actually had the audacity to look slightly put out. "Well, it's not like I can feel anything. The more interesting aspects of the female form are lost to me forever, you know. It's a little drawback that one experiences when _dead_."

Crossing her arms protectively (and futilely) across her chest, Sango tried to glare but only managed to lower her eyelids slightly. Was this what her world had turned into - being groped in her own home by a handsome specter? "I think it's the least of the favors that you can do for me," the ghost went on, lowering his hands now and looking oddly at home among the mild clutter.

Sango finally managed to push herself to her feet, her eyes narrowed and her arms crossed now with more annoyance than protection. "You're still on about that, huh? Listen, I've given it a lot of thought, and there's no possible way that I could have killed you. I've never met you before, and I'd appreciate it if you left me alone."

"Impossible," the spirit answered immediately. "I've told you, that's the one thing that I do remember."

"But if you don't remember anything else," Sango replied, forgetting her pact not to acknowledge the spirit's existence, "how do you know that what you're remembering is fact?"

The ghost looked at her for a while, giving her a very clear view of his disturbingly human violet eyes, then gave a shrug. "If I'm to be honest with you, I don't."

Sango tossed the semi-saturated cloth onto the floor, where it landed half-draped over the spill (which would probably stain, she thought fleetingly). "You're impossible, Ghost. Get the hell out of my hou-"

Sango had to blink a few times before what she had seen finally registered in her mind. As she'd been watching, the spirit had slowly become more and more transparent, until he'd vanished from sight completely. Rubbing her arm as the cold feeling slowly dissipated, she realized something with a jolt.

This wasn't her imagination. She was being haunted by someone that she didn't know, and as of now, there was nothing that she could do about it. He didn't respect her privacy - hell, he didn't respect her _body_ - and there was nothing that she could do to be sure that he'd leave her alone for good. After all, he was haunting her because he was sure that she'd killed him-

In the process of opening her laptop, Sango froze. "That's it," she whispered to herself. If he was around her just because he believed that, if she could find his real killer, it should follow that he'd move on to haunt that person...

"Ghost!" she shouted, looking around as if expecting to see the summoned 'man' appear immediately, sort of as if he were her personal servant. When he didn't appear, she put her hands on her hips, truly irritated at his failure to appear. "Hey, Casper!" Still no answer.

"Fine, then," she muttered to herself, retrieving the cloth from the floor and trotting to her room to deposit it into the dirty clothes hamper with a sigh. "If he won't come, I'll do it myself." Returning to her study, she plopped back into her chair and stretched back, yawning slightly and cracking her knuckles as she set to her original intentions.

Even so, she kept glancing over her shoulder every now and then, checking to see if the ghost had appeared.

---

After her obligatory e-mail check, which yielded nothing of great importance, Sango had dressed quickly and almost haphazardly. Spending less than a minute shuffling through her closet, she ended up wearing dark gray jogging pants with pink stripes up the side and a pink tank top. The top was significantly lighter than the stripes in the pants, but that was the least of her worries.

The library was farther from her home than the museum was, and it was for this reason that Sango decided to take her bicycle. It was a beautiful day for riding; the air was scrubbed clean from the previous day's rain, the remnants of which had all but evaporated except for small puddles here and there.

Sango was glad to find that her bike wasn't dripping wet and, within minutes, she was flying down the sidewalk with her ponytail flapping behind her. In mere minutes, she rode past the coffee shop where Kagome worked, and recalled that the younger girl wasn't working that morning. She made a mental note to give Kagome a call and ask how her classes had gone.

Splashing through a particularly deep puddle on the deeply pitted sidewalk, Sango finally turned into the cul-de-sac that served as the library's driveway. The large building was in the shape of a half-circle, sitting rather close to the curb. The large windows facing the street were framed with clusters of low bushes. These same bushes were planted on either side of the large, painted red door.

After chaining her bike to the rack near the door, she pushed the door open and entered. Unlike modern libraries, this one prided itself in its antique feel. Shunning bright fluorescents, the library was lit by specially crafted lamps that encased the flame in nigh-unbreakable glass, and would resist all attempts to alter the height of the flame. Even so, the lamps were so situated that the librarians' combined efforts could easily supervise them. Well-placed mirrors reflected the light and provided more illumination as well as a nearly overwhelming sense of hugeness.

Letting the door close softly behind her, Sango moved toward the long front desk where a bespectacled woman sat. The pale light of the lamp beside her threw her face into odd relief, but she was undeniably pretty. Her long, straight hair was piled atop her head in a stereotypical bun, and she was bent over a rather large book.

"Excuse me," Sango said quietly, approaching her and managing a friendly smile. The woman looked up with a friendly smile.

"Yes?" she asked, slipping a bookmark between the crisp pages and looking up expectantly.

Sango absently rubbed her arms; the day was humid, but the temperature inside the library was quite cool. It probably had something to do with protecting the books. "I'm looking for a newspaper article. It should have appeared in Tokyo Shimbun," she said confidently.

The librarian slid her chair back and reached into a low drawer, pulling out a small ring of keys. "Do you know when this article was published?"

Sango thought for a moment, then shook her head slowly. She had no idea when the ghost had died, and therefore had no idea what years that she should comb through for news of his death. If he had truly been murdered, then there should have been a report of it somewhere. "I'm not sure," she told the librarian, then added, "but I think it would have been within the past five years."

"I see," said the librarian with a nod, pushing her glasses up further onto her nose. "We are an old-fashioned library, so the two earliest years will be on microfilm, but the other three can be searched for at the computer terminal in the archive room." She stepped from behind the desk and motioned for Sango to follow her.

The pair wound through shelves crammed tightly with literature, finally reaching a door near the back of the building. Opening this door with a heavy-looking bronze key, the librarian ushered Sango inside. The room smelled of disuse and faint mold, owing to the stacks of newspaper that decorated the low tables. They were obviously merely for decoration; there seemed to be no organization to them. It was evident that this room was rarely used from the thin layer of dust coating the computer in one corner and the microfilm reader in another.

"I'd recommend starting with the computer and working your way backward in time, moving to the microfilm when you must," the librarian said, moving to a metal cabinet near the door. The cabinet was obviously better organized than the rest of the room; in moments, she'd pressed two rolls of microfilm into Sango's hand. "I'm sure that you already know this, but please do not remove these from the room. When you finish, you may leave them at the front desk." With the obligatory spiel done, the librarian excused herself from the room with a shallow bow, the heavy door shutting behind her.

Rubbing her arms again, Sango sighed and slid into the seat at the computer. This was the easy part; it would take her no time to search through the virtual entries for the word 'murder'.

Judging by the clothes that ghost-boy had been wearing, Sango figured that he couldn't have died all that long ago. She limited the search to those in the last three years, clicked the 'search' button, and was immediately deluged with thousands of articles.

"Oh, gods," Sango sighed to herself, and quickly changed her search terms to include the exact phrase "young man" as well. Now, when she clicked 'search', she received almost a round nine hundred. Well, it was better than nine thousand, that was for sure. Taking a deep breath, she began to work her way through the hits.

---

"_...the striking story of a **young man **falsely accused of the **murder** of his lover, premieres on July 19, 2004."_

There was a solid thunk as Sango's head hit the desk next to the keyboard. She was a little less than halfway through the returned articles, but she had yet to come across much that referred to something that wasn't related to the arts or another country.

"This would be so much easier if I knew his _name_," she snarled into the desk. Her eyes stung with fatigue, and she wondered just how long she'd been there, trying to find something, anything, about the person who'd become the ghost that was haunting her. When she'd left her house, it had been a quarter past eleven; checking her cell phone, which was clipped to her side, she saw that it was now almost four in the afternoon. The library closed in a couple of hours.

Rubbing her face with her hands, Sango calmly told herself that there was no way that she'd be able to get to the microfilm that day. She wouldn't even be able to get through the rest of the internet queries that day.

"What are you up to?" a voice asked from behind her. Sango halted halfway though a stretch and turned around so quickly that she almost upended her chair.

The voice had come from the other side of the room, where the microfilm reader sat. "Who-" Sango began, moments before her eyes fell on the figure perched weightlessly atop the reader.

The ghost sat there, an inscrutable smile on his face. Sango was vaguely aware that he seemed much more _there_ than he had before, more translucent than transparent. In the dim light, he looked far more like a stereotypical ghost than he had before. There were no lanterns in the room since the fire hazard was a bit higher with the old papers scattered around; all of the light came from the computer screens and a single shaded lamp in the corner. Because of this, the slanted rays of light actually caused the ghost to cast odd, barely-there shadows.

The moment of eeriness lasted only a moment, then the ghost hopped weightlessly from the top of the machine and took a few steps toward her. "Sango?"

She cleared her throat, remembering that he was expecting an answer from her. That moment, seeing him in such ethereal lighting, had reminded her of just how real her problem was. "I'm doing research," she answered finally, turning back to the computer screen and beginning to click around once more and trying to look busy. Of course, this tactic failed to accomplish anything.

A gust of cool air hit Sango's cheek as he leaned over her shoulder, peering at the screen. Her shoulder tensed, but she didn't turn around. After a few long moments, the specter finally spoke up. "What are you up to?" he asked again, a slightly cold edge in his voice.

"I'm trying to find out who killed you," Sango replied succinctly. Bluntness was probably best in this situation. "I know that it wasn't me, and I figure that you'll leave me alone once I find you someone else to haunt."

The coldness over her shoulder vanished, and its absence was so sudden that Sango couldn't help but turn around. The ghost stood just behind her, his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes still trained on the computer screen. His expression was once more unreadable. "Well, that's rude," he said stiffly. "I'm here, sure of only your name and your connection with me, and you immediately try to prove that my entire existence is a lie."

"Fair enough," Sango snapped. "It is."

The spirit looked at her then, his semi-transparent violet eyes adding another level to his otherworldliness. He didn't speak, just contemplated her until she began to get slightly uncomfortable. "Wh... where have you been, anyway?" she asked finally, as the silence between them grew painful. "I would have told you what I was doing sooner if you'd answered when I'd called you."

"Right. First I'm a liar, and now, I'm a butler," he shot back, but the look of hurt that his eyes had carried just moments earlier was already fading. "I couldn't answer you. I couldn't even hear you," he said seriously. "When I affect the real world, like when I moved your stuff around this morning, it kills my energy. I don't know where I go when I leave here..." he paused to shiver, an odd sight, "but I just know that I don't like it. There's no light. As soon as I could, I brought myself back into this world, into this very room."

He spread his arms out to his sides, as if inviting her to study his form. Of course, she couldn't help but comply, and she noticed the differences in his appearance even more clearly than normal. The purple of his t-shirt was more vibrant than it had been yesterday, and his hair had a glossy sheen that it had lacked before. She'd already noticed his eyes, but she realized for the first time that he was barefoot. "I'll just keep getting dimmer and dimmer until I'm pulled... away," he finished vaguely, dropping his hands to his sides.

Sango pinched the bridge of her nose with the fingers of her right hand. "So... when you're not here... you're _there_?"

"Not really," the ghost said with a grin. "I _am_ a ghost, after all. I don't have to be visible to exist."

As if to illustrate this point, he suddenly vanished.

Sango looked around, thought she knew it was futile. If he didn't want to be seen, chances were that he wouldn't be. She turned to the computer again, contemplating whether or not to continue or stop for the day, when icy fingers wrapped around her neck from behind. Alarmed, Sango raised her hands to her throat, but they touched only her own flesh. The sensation didn't vanish, however, and she was beginning to panic until she felt another touch. This one happened to be on her left breast.

"Ghost-boy!" she snarled, lashing out backward before remembering that there was no substance to hit. As a result, she upended her chair and went tumbling backward into one of the dusty, almost rotting piles of newspaper. The feel of the hands disappeared, but she could definitely hear the sound of the ghost's laughter.

She was about to begin a long-winded rant, but before she could even begin, the heavy door swung open and in walked the librarian. Her glasses were now perched on top of her head instead of in front of her eyes. "Are you all right?" she asked, sounding rather concerned even though a small smile quirked the corner of her mouth. "I was shelving books nearby and I heard you shout."

"Fine," Sango growled out, climbing gingerly to her feet and setting the chair up, rolling it back under the desk. "I think I'm done here," she sighed, gesturing to the rolls of microfilm. "Will I be able to come back and look at these later?"

"Of course," the other woman answered with a polite nod. "We will be closed for much of this week for inventory, but we'll be open again on Friday."

Sango sighed inwardly. Friday. Today was only Tuesday, meaning that there would be nothing that she could do about her haunting issues for quite a while. "Thank you," she said finally, grabbing up the microfilm and handing it to the librarian. "I'm leaving now."

"I hope you find what you're looking for," the librarian answered cheerfully, stepping aside to allow Sango past. Retracing her steps through the shelves, Sango sighed again as she exited the building, the warm air reminding her of just how cold it had been when the ghost had touched her. Shaking her head, she walked over to where her bike was chained and gasped as, when she touched the chain, she felt that it was almost freezing. "What the..."

Upon closer inspection, she noticed a small slip of paper wedged into one of the chain links. Kneeling, she plucked it out with some difficulty. The link was very small and the paper had had to be rolled until it tore in a few places, but that was of little consequence. Smoothing the paper between her fingers, she read the note three times without really understanding it.

Then, with an almost hopeful look around, she stuffed the paper into her sock (the pants that she was wearing had no pockets) and unchained the bike, riding off swiftly. Her head pounding, she hoped that this new information would help.

The note had been written in large, shaky letters, almost like those of a child. Obviously, the pen that had been used had kept slipping into the ghost's fingers. It had read:

_Sango-_

_I remember. My name, that is. It's Nakano Miroku._

_You can still call me Ghost-boy if you want._

_Your phantom,_

_Miroku_


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

_It's not me  
Buried wreckage my soul  
It's not me  
So who am I now?_

_-The Used, _Light With a Sharpened Edge

Sango awoke early the next morning to the sound of the television blaring.

Needless to say, she was far from pleased. It wasn't as if she wasn't accustomed to waking up with noise in the background, but normally, that noise was her own fault. Groggily, she sat up, perturbed by the fact that the sun probably wouldn't have woken her up for another hour if she'd been allowed to remain asleep. Her eyes half-lidded, she climbed out of bed and stalked toward her study, exuding a palpable aura of semi-consciousness.

The ghost was sitting in her computer chair, hugging his knees to his chest. His eyes were fixed on the television, which displayed a rather cheesy-looking scene from an early-morning drama that she never bothered to watch, though she knew that Kagome watched it religiously and never spared Sango a single detail when a particularly good episode had aired.

He looked up as she came in, and offered a bright smile. "Good morning, Sango."

Sango blinked first at him, then the screen, then back at him. "Why are you watching my TV, Ghost-boy?"

Miroku gestured at the television. "I remember this show," he said, not really answering her question at all. "I think this is the episode where Itsukune professes his undying love for-"

Sango threw up a hand. "You're not answering my question. I'm running on about four hours of sleep, and your tangents may invoke unpredictable behavior." She spared a glance at the television, where a woman wearing makeup so thick that she probably couldn't lift her head properly was sobbing face-up on a bed.

"Well, I don't think any of your neighbors would appreciate their televisions turning on at this time of the morning," Miroku responded cheerfully. "Plus, I figured that you would lament a missed opportunity to be upset at me."

The woman paused for a moment, opened her mouth as if to argue, and shut it again. "Coffee," was her eventual response, and she shuffled off to the kitchen. Grinning, Miroku followed, making a point not to turn the television down so that the cheesy dialogue remained audible.

Grumbling to herself, Sango opened a cabinet and began to shift its contents aside, on a quest that would hopefully lead to the placidity that only early-morning caffeine could bring about. After a few seconds, she frowned and slammed the cabinet shut. Today, of all days, she was out of coffee. Cursing her luck, she turned to head off to her bedroom and almost walked right through the ghost, who was standing far too close for comfort.

"Excuse me," she said in a false-cheery voice that was a threat in itself. Admittedly, there wasn't much that she could do to a dead man, but she was willing to do her best.

"You could just walk through me, you know," Miroku informed her with a teasing smile. Sango suddenly had a very disconcerting image of herself being groped while halfway inside him.

"No, thanks," she replied, then sidestepped him and stepped out into the hallway, knowing that if she wanted coffee that morning, she'd have to seek it out. Miroku's voice called after her.

"I'll bet that you wouldn't find my touch so repulsive if I were alive."

Halting in the doorway to her room, Sango craned her neck back slightly to reply. "Somehow, I doubt that." She slipped into the room and shut the door behind her, for all the good it would do. It would appear that Miroku had learned to behave himself, though, and hadn't made any further intrusions after their first meeting.

Sighing, Miroku made his way back to his original seat in the study.

* * *

Sango didn't pause to say good-bye to her resident specter as she walked past the study and out of the front door. She'd drawn her hair into a high ponytail and thrown on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. Under no circumstances could that be called 'dressing for success'—unless, of course, success entailed a steaming cup of java. He didn't attempt conversation, either, although he may just have been wrapped up in the ending of the terrible melodrama.

Checking her watch, Sango calculated that Kagome would be leaving her own house within the next few minutes; she usually left for the coffee shop right after the show that the ghost was watching went off. If Sango took her time, she'd probably end up arriving right when her friend did.

As she began to walk, she pondered her situation. It really hadn't taken long for her to accept Ghost-boy as a part of her daily routine, oddly enough. She'd gone from trying to hit him with a plunger to leaving him alone in her house watching soap operas. Despite what he was accusing her of, he wasn't really treating Sango like a criminal at all; on the contrary, he was behaving as if they'd been good friends while he was alive. Maybe he just wasn't one to hold a grudge.

In any case, Sango had made it her mission to figure out who had really killed him, if only to get him to leave her in peace. Her normally uneventful days were now anything but, though she now had something on which to focus her attention.

The bell over the door let out a sharp 'ding' as Sango moved inside and took a seat at the bar. One of the morning waitresses, a woman whose name escaped Sango at the moment, smiled and gave her a cheerful nod that was understood to mean 'I'll get to you in a second'. Sango amused herself by pulling a coffee stirrer out of a nearby dispenser and beginning to twist and bend it.

Not two minutes after she'd entered, the door opened once more and Kagome stepped in. A grin crossed her face as she saw Sango, who was the only patron except for the man whose coffee the other worker was preparing and a woman sitting at one of the booths. "Morning," she greeted, walking through the waist-height swinging doors that led to the other side of the counter. Stooping, she retrieved her red apron from beneath the counter and tossed it over her head, expertly knotting it behind her. "What can I do for you?"

"Coffee," Sango replied gruffly, not in the mood to debate with herself over the different styles of coffees and flavorings. She'd let Kagome choose.

Kagome nodded and reached for a cup. "Long night?" she asked as she crossed to the espresso machine. From the refrigerator beside it, she produced a gallon jug of milk and poured a bit into the cup and chased it with flavoring before setting it beneath the machine's dispenser to let it work its magic.

"You have no idea," Sango said with a groan, dropping the red stirrer and glaring at it. "Actually, I just failed at falling asleep and woke up far too early."

Kagome laughed. "That much, I can tell. It's been a while since I've seen you in here this early. Oh, well. At least I get to tell you about the episode of _Like-Love-Romance _that aired this morning while it's still fresh on my mind!" She pulled the cup away from the machine, topped it with whipped cream, and set it in front of Sango.

Sango stared at the drink, then took a big gulp. It scalded her mouth, of course, but she couldn't bring herself to mind too much. "Don't bother," she said. "Itsukune professed undying love for somebody-or-other, right?"

Kagome gave her a strange look. "I didn't know you followed the show."

With the coffee cup pressed to her mouth again, Sango couldn't reply. She used the time to think up a viable excuse. The last thing she wanted was to explain to Kagome why she knew what this particular episode had been about. Any explanation that she gave might hint at the fact that it had actually been airing on her television.

Setting the cup back on the counter, she said, "I suppose I remember you talking about it at some point or another, that's all. Call it intuition."

The younger girl blinked, then shook her head. "It couldn't have been that. Today's episode was the season finale—a new episode."

Now, it was Sango's turn to stare. The ghost had told her that he remembered this episode, hadn't he? How could he remember something that hadn't happened until after his death? Of course, he could have just been mistaken about it... but it was far too coincidental. Maybe ghosts got premonitions... "I might have heard someone talking about it on the way here," Sango said finally. "After all, everyone seems to watch it but me."

Kagome nodded as if she accepted this answer, but there was something in her eyes that hinted that she wasn't completely convinced. The bell over the door dinged again, and Kagome moved off to the new customer, leaving Sango to enjoy her coffee and think.

The next time Kagome passed by her, Sango's cup was empty and she was preparing to leave. She figured that, since she was fully alert now, she could get a couple of hours of searching done at the library before grabbing a bite for lunch. Sliding the cup into the hole in the counter that camouflaged the trashcan below, Sango flagged down Kagome one last time.

"Hey, Kagome? This might seem like an odd question, but do you know of any murders that have happened around here recently?" If she was going to do this right, she might as well use sources that she could think of.

Kagome tapped her finger on the counter and frowned. "Not any that I can think of right off the bat. There was that woman who was found a few weeks ago, but that's still under investigation since it may have been a suicide."

Sango shook her head. "The murder I'm talking about involved a young man," she amended. Though she knew Miroku's name, now, she was reluctant to use it. There was no sense in getting herself wrapped up too deeply in this—though, with a slain man's ghost haunting her, how much deeper could she bury herself?

Kagome didn't think nearly as long this time. "No, I don't think so. There's been nothing like that, as far as I've heard. Why do you ask?"

"No reason, really," Sango said, her voice full of false cheeriness. "Just... wondering, sort of." She hopped off the stool. "Are we still on for movies tonight?" she asked.

The younger girl beamed. "You've got it," she affirmed. "See you at eight?"

With a nod, Sango sealed the deal and left the coffee shop.

* * *

Stepping onto the sidewalk and into the ample crowd of people beginning their morning commute, it dawned on Sango that she could at least make significant headway at the library in her search for the ghost's true killer, now that she knew his name. Of course, since this had just occurred to her, she hadn't thought to bring her bike along. It would take her quite a while to walk there, so if she really wanted to go, she'd have to head back home to get it.

For a moment, she debated forgetting it for the day and spending the day shopping, but curiosity was getting the better of her. What with the oddity of Miroku knowing about the morning soap opera, this was a mystery that she wanted to solve as soon as possible.

Making up her mind, Sango turned to head in the direction that would take her back to her home, her eyes on her feet and her mind deep in thought. Apparently, her sudden change of course in the middle of the crowd took those around her by surprise; her shoulder hit that of a passing woman hard enough to make her drop her purse. Apologizing, Sango knelt to pick it up, but was swatted away and huffed at by the woman, who grabbed it herself and continued to walk. Straightening and shaking her head, Sango moved forward again, only to run into someone else.

This collision wasn't as harmless as the other. The man had been holding a nearly full cup of orange juice in his hand, and when he was hit, it tipped out of his hand and splashed all over Sango's front. In an attempt to ward off the juice, Sango leapt backward, only to overbalance and land on her back on the ground. "Ow," she grumbled pointedly, before looking down at her hopelessly stained pale blue shirt. At least she hadn't chosen to wear white.

"I'm sorry!" the man said quickly, extending a hand to help her to her feet. Sango ignored the hand, standing on her own, then gazing morosely down at the large stain on her shirt. "I should have been paying a bit more attention. Are you okay?"

Sango sighed and nodded. "I'm fine. Just a little embarrassed. I-" She lost the thread of what she was going to say as she looked up at the man's face. Every one of his features was frightfully familiar, and in the same second that she made the connection in her mind, his name came out of her mouth. "_Nakano_?"

Indeed it was. From the black hair in a ponytail to the sincere violet eyes to the earrings, he was the spitting image of the ghost who had been haunting her for the past couple of days. He raised an eyebrow at her, then smiled. "You know my na-?" He was cut off as Sango seized his upper arm and jerked him off the sidewalk, toward a bench.

"What are you doing here?" she hissed angrily, looking around at the passerby and hoping that they didn't see her speaking to midair. "I swear, if this is part of your plot to make my life miserable, I will never forgive you!"

He blinked. "Wha-"

Sango wasn't quite done. "I mean, really, this is the last straw! Not only are you everywhere I go, but you show up and spill orange juice on me? What kind of thanks is that for my helping you?" she seethed, her eyes narrowed.

He stared at her for a few more seconds, then rolled his eyes skyward. "What have I done this time?" he muttered under his breath, then spoke to her. "I'm sorry, but have we met?"

"What do you mean, have w... of course we..." Sango paused, then, and began to actually go over the situation. What sense would it make for the spirit to be walking around on the sidewalk, much less with a glass of orange juice? And why... why was she able to hold on to his upper arm, which was warm, solid, and very real? She realized then that her hand was still on his arm and released it as if she'd been burned.

This man... _this _Nakano... was _alive_.

Sango's mouth dropped open. Luckily, she was saved having to reply by Nakano, who snapped his fingers in recognition. "Ah, now I remember! I saw you at the coffee shop a couple of days ago. I held the door open for you on my way out." He gave her a charming grin that didn't affect her much through her haze of disbelief. "I never forget a pretty face," he said matter-of-factly, crossing his arms.

"Ah," Sango said weakly, her mind racing. "Right. I should... be going, then..."

Nakano seemed unperturbed. "All right. I hope I didn't ruin your day with the orange juice," he said. "Maybe I'll make a better impression on you if we happen to meet again."

"Uh-huh," Sango said, without thinking, then turned as if to walk away. She'd only taken a few steps before she felt a brush on her backside. With no hesitation, she whirled and whacked the offender across the face (who would it be but Nakano?). He tottered and almost fell into a store display before catching his balance. Cradling his cheek with one hand, he used his other to wave cheerfully at Sango, who reddened, glared, and strode off.

Her life had gotten a whole lot more complicated, but it wasn't nearly bad enough for her to forgive a pervert, whether he was supposed to be dead or not.

* * *

It seemed to take Sango no time to reach her front door, though her perspective was likely altered by the fact that she had so much on her mind. She'd undergone several changes in mood, from confusion to anger at Nakano to, finally, anger at the ghost who was probably sitting with his feet up, watching her television.

She jammed the key into the lock and shoved the door open, her eyes immediately darting around for any sign of her otherworldly houseguest. When he didn't greet her at the door, she stepped inside, slammed the door behind her, and called, "Ghost-boy, get out here!"

There was no answer. Kicking off her shoes and dropping her keys on the small table near the door, Sango made for the study. The television was still and silent, and there was no sign of the ghost. Folding her arms, Sango shouted, "Damn it, don't try to hide from me this time! Where are you!"

Just as she was about ready to admit that perhaps he'd moved out of existence like he had the previous day, someone spoke from the doorway. "How may I be of service?"

Sango didn't bother to react to the mildly teasing tone of his voice; he was probably pleasantly surprised at her seeking out his company. "You. You're haunting me for no reason." She narrowed her eyes and stepped forward. "I was out walking today, and who should spill orange juice all over me but... _you_."

The ghost stared in silence for a moment. "Wait... what?"

"You. Are. Not. Dead. By the way, don't bother trying to tell me that everyone has a double or something like that. He responded to your name and is just as much of a pervert as you are." Suddenly tired, she sat down in her desk chair and lifted a hand to her forehead.

Neither spoke for the next few minutes. After a few minutes, Miroku shook his head and said, "That can't be... I told you, that's what I remember. It was what brought me here. It doesn't make sense."

"Yeah, well, your being here doesn't make much sense, either," Sango pointed out wearily. It was as if she had never had that cup of coffee. "I don't know—maybe you have out-of-body experiences or something."

"That wouldn't explain how I knew your name," he said matter-of-factly. "You'd never met this 'other me' before, right?"

"Right," Sango replied, too perplexed to be angry any longer. Something was bothering her, though; there was something that she was forgetting...

It came to her in a flash. This morning, the ghost had said that he'd seen that episode of that soap opera before, but it had been a new episode, according to Kagome. The only way that he could have recognized it was if... The day just kept getting more and more bizarre. "_Like-Love-Romance_'s season finale was what you were watching this morning. There's no way that you could have seen it before you died, unless..."

After a moment, realization widened the ghost's eyes. Haltingly, he finished the sentence. "...I'm not dead... _yet_." Miroku managed to sit down heavily on the floor, even though he was completely incorporeal. "Well, damn. I'm a ghost from the future." He blinked a few times, then looked up at Sango with a large grin. "Would you like a conspiracy theory to go with your Twilight Zone?"

"This is not funny," she snapped. "If you're not dead yet, then why are you here? I don't even know you—the living you, I mean—so there's really no chance that I'll end up killing you."

"On the contrary," Miroku said, his grin turning into something a bit more sly. "If I'm not here to punish you for killing me, then I'm here to _keep_ you from killing me."

Sango turned to her desk and clicked on her computer with a sigh. "You won't have to worry about that," she said, "since I have no plans to see the living you again. So you can just leave me a-" Looking back at the doorway, she was greeted with nothing but empty space. Miroku was gone. "...lone," she finished irritably, then tilted her head back and called out. "Kagome's coming over at eight, so you'd better behave yourself!"

Putting her elbows on the desk, she rested her head on her hands and stared unseeingly at the computer screen. Her situation was now drastically different; instead of merely having to prove that she hadn't killed someone, she now had to make it clear that she didn't _plan _to kill him, an altogether more difficult task.

There was a new e-mail sitting in her inbox amid the smattering of newsletters that she regularly received. It was from an address that she didn't recognize, but the subject line caught her attention rather quickly: 'Kagome asked me to tell you not to kill her'.

Dread pooling in her stomach, she clicked the message.

_Dear Sango,_

_Though you may delete this before getting completely through it, I figured it was worth a try. Kagome told me your e-mail address; I think she wants you to get out more. In any case, I hope you'll give this poor pervert a bit of your time._

Sango gaped at the screen, but couldn't help but read on.

_I don't want you to have a bad opinion of me because of this morning. Well actually, it was only about half an hour ago, and I'm sending this from an internet café, but that's beside the point. As such, I'm volunteering to make it up to you. How about going out to dinner sometime? Of course, I don't expect you to go with me alone; Kagome has volunteered to come along with one of her male friends. Call it reimbursement, or whatever you wish. (I, of course, will be calling it a 'date'.)_

_You can get back to me at this address. I'll be awaiting your response._

_Nakano Miroku_

As Sango's disbelief began to fade, she realized that staying away from Nakano might be a lot harder than she'd first thought.

With a click, she deleted the message, and deemed that a good start.


End file.
